


The 2:38 Project

by 105NorthTower



Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: 1992, Arsenal FC, Blue Dress Love, Bonfires, But this time it's not him, F/F, F/M, FA Cup, Foot Massage, Foreplay, Ice, Oral Sex, Outdoor Sex, Post-Coital, Post-Troubled Blood, Quick sex is sometimes good sex, Sex In A Cave, Sharing, Slow Build, The Ritz, We hate Matthew, bras, whisky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-14 03:48:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29786001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/105NorthTower/pseuds/105NorthTower
Summary: I'm not going to write this, that much is clear.What happens in the two hours and thirty-eight minutes mentioned in Pure Indulgence.Will make more sense if you read veni vino venetia and Pure Indulgence, first, but can probably be read alone.Post Troubled Blood. After The Ritz.
Relationships: Robin Ellacott/Cormoran Strike
Comments: 79
Kudos: 62





	1. All Who Hesitate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoomBar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoomBar/gifts).



> Not all who hesitate are lost  
> Joseph Campbell

00:05

The door closed behind Strike and he turned to watch Robin slowly back away into the flat.

All the way home from The Ritz, she'd sought all kinds of contact with him: sliding her fingers between his, tracing lines between the buttons on his shirt, resting her cheek on his shoulder, and he'd happily reciprocated: shielding her from the rest of the carriage, playing with the loops on her belt, steadying her as the tube train rocked and swayed. 

When St Giles sounded eleven, she'd pulled him into a long, intense kiss in the doorway, and he'd turned her slowly away from the street, letting his coat fall around her to afford some privacy as she moved her hips gently through the ghost of a son Cubano under his hands.

But now, in his space, her movements had lost their earlier fluidity, becoming hesitant. Her fingers had left his and her hands clasped together. She turned her head from his gaze uneasily.

"Have I got this wrong, Robin?"

"What do you mean?"

"Should I take you home?"

She shook her head, "I'm a little out of practice, I suppose. Nervous."

"Are you nervous of all intimacy or is it because it's me?"

She scoffed. "Well, I've never been with the great Cormoran Strike before. I don't know what he likes."

He smiled. "I've never been with the talented Robin Ellacott before. I don't know what she likes."

"Sad thing is ... I don't think she does, either."

"Then we can find out. If she wants to find out. With me."

"Oh, she wants to. But she ... I don't want to ..." she shrugged, "... mess this up."

"I don't think you could ..."

"Ha! Keep saying that. It's early."

"Robin Ellacott, there's nothing you can conceivably do that would make me not want you ..."

She liked him saying that, he could see. Her head dipped down instead of turning to the side, and she looked up again almost immediately, with a small smile. 

He looked around the tiny flat. "Right, c'mere ..."

He threw the cushion from his armchair, the only place to sit apart from the Formica table with its two fixed seats. Grabbing his coat, he threw it over the chair, with the soft outer fabric uppermost.

"Close your eyes, Robin."

She did. He took both her hands and led her there.

"Sit down. Eyes closed."

She sat and sank back, spreading her fingers over the cloth. The smell of Virginia blend, lavender and Arran single malt enveloped her.

"You're home after a long day of very high-end sleuthing. Sitting on your blue velvet sofa, thinking about what you're going to drink."

"Glass of Arran. One ice cube."

"The cook has gone to arrange it. While he's gone, the gardener comes in to explain that the ground elder has finally been dealt with, and mentions a trifling injury he's sustained, in the course of his work."

"Hmm ... I should hear some more about that. There's a form he needs to fill in."

"Quite so. But the pressures of being London's top private investigator and an employer and your horse being under the vet for ..."

"Bruised hooves."

"Yes that, has tired you out. But it's all right, because the gardener - name of Strike ..."

"Coincidence!"

"... is also a trained podiatrist and recognises what you really need is to take your shoes off and have a foot massage."

"His hands are big ..."

"... and strong. They're the perfect hands for the part. But you're his boss, so he's not just going to do that. He's got to ask you, first."

"I think ... that would be OK ..."

Strike dragged a small table, usually employed to hold his beer, from the side of the chair. Sitting on it, he touched his fingers to Robin's right ankle. She started, but didn't pull away. He lifted her foot, at first only enough to slip off her shoe, and then fully onto his lap. With one hand laid over her foot to keep it steady, he cupped her heel, then dragged his fingers firmly along the arch and clutched the ball of her foot, spreading and kneeding her toes with his fingers. All his movements were languid and slow.

"Alright?"

"Hmm."

He repeated the movement until all tension seemed have gone from her muscles, then raised the other foot up. When he'd finished, he glanced upwards and caught her watching, attentively. 

"You have the touch, Mr Strike."

"Please," he said. "Lose the Mr. Just call me Strike."

He lifted her legs to the floor, and smoothed each hand from her ankle to the hough of her knee, where his fingers met the soft blue jersey of her dress.

00:25


	2. You See/ Come Take My Hand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> But you don't ever, you don't ever have to walk alone  
> You see, come take my hand, and baby, won't you walk with me?  
> Cry to Me, Solomon Burke

00:25

Robin expected his hands to continue under her dress. Her experience of men was that their capacity for delayed gratification was somewhat limited. 

It had been nice of Strike to slow things down, but now she was over her initial jitters ... things would revert to their usual pattern. It wasn't an unwelcome idea.

To her surprise, the hands at the hem of her dress were withdrawn. Strike was on his feet, holding out his arm to her.

"Will you?"

She wriggled to a seated position and took his hand, allowing him to pull her up. Nor did he lead her towards the area she knew contained his bed. He let go her hand and looked at her.

"I wanted to see this dress."

"OK ... unexpected."

"It's a very good dress."

"You like it?"

He gave her a pointed look. "You know I do."

"Do I?"

He reached for the ties that held the wrap in place. Robin held her breath in anticipation that he would pull the ties free and begin the process of undressing her, but he let the fabric run through his fingers and drop back against her hip, where the point of its slight impact on her thigh burned.

"Did you ... wear it for me?"

He touched a finger to her skin at the neckline where it rested on her shoulder, and followed the V to its nadir between her breasts.

"Strike ..."

He bent his head to place a soft kiss on her mouth.

"Did you?"

"Yes." 

She would have liked him to kiss her again, but he seemed distracted by the neckline of the dress, tracing it up to her other shoulder and stepping behind her so he could run his finger across the to the nape of her neck. He paused there, she could feel his warm breath in her hair and then his hands slipped around her waist and pulled her gently back against him. He nuzzled the side of her neck and she weighed the contrast of his hands soft on her belly and the scrape of his stubbled jaw against her skin. 

After a few seconds, he broke away and moved around her again, standing to one side and insinuating his fingers under the hem of her sleeve, pushing the soft jersey fabric away until it collected at her shoulder and allowed him to ghost her bicep with the back of his hand. He returned to stand in front of her.

"Do you have to wear a bra with it?"

"You mean in general, or right now?"

"Both."

She rested her forehead against his shirt for a moment.

"Um, so ... in general I do. Because otherwise they move around too much."

"Difficult concept for a heterosexual male to come to terms with: too much movement in this context."

She raised her head. "You asked, Strike, and I'm telling you."

"Go on."

"Right now, not if you'd like me not to."

"Can you take it off without taking off the dress?"

She smiled. "Of course. But you can't look."

"I've seen Ilsa do it."

"Then Ilsa's more uninhibited around you than I am."

He nodded and turned to the kitchen. "I'll get you that drink. Are you sure about the ice cube?"

"I'm sure."

As she unfastened the clasp of her bra through the jersey fabric, and drew the straps down her arms, she could hear him talking to himself. 

"Because it's a waste of the good stuff to stick ice in it and I've a mind to give you that blend that Lucy bought me. I was saving it to disinfect the drains."

Robin reached into the neckline of her dress and pulled her bra free, tossing it into her handbag as Strike bought her whisky.

"That's better."

She took the glass and smiled her agreement.

00:50


	3. Marble and Gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when I went out to tell her  
> the love that can't be told  
> she hid in themes of marble  
> and deep reliefs of gold
> 
> Book of Longing, Leonard Cohen

00:50

"You know, this dress isn't even really mine."

Strike watched her sip at the whisky and, once satisfied she wasn't gulping it down to overcome any nerves, he sat on the armchair and pulled her onto his lap.

"Whose dress is it?"

She looped the arm closest to him around his neck and rested it on the back of the chair. She smelled of whisky and her new perfume, with an undercurrent of other scents: some of these - smoke, lavender, lemongrass - she had picked up from him.

"My cousin, Katie. She was at the wedding. Very, very pregnant."

The position of her arm made the neck of her dress gape and revealed the side of her breast. He wondered if she realised and decided not to draw attention to it. 

"I remember." He trailed his fingers up her arm, across her shoulder and into her amber hair, cupping the back of her head and pulling her in for a kiss. He already knew she liked being kissed but not hard, so he used his lips to tease her mouth until it opened under his, and allowed their whiskied tongues to meet. When they broke apart she was a little breathless and her nipples had hardened, making peaks in the soft fabric of the dress.

_Shit._ "Tell me about it." _Anything that stops me pushing this too fast, losing control, fucking you right now._

She plucked the cushion from where he had tossed it on the floor, and tucked it between her back and the arm of the chair, so she could recline against it. With her head against a sea of her own hair she closed her eyes and arched her back. _Not helping._

"Katie bought it in Harrogate. She wanted to wear it on a date. It was the perfect colour to go with her favourite shoes."

She raised her head to take a sip of her whisky. The details of the story were of no consequence, but he loved to hear her talk. She broke into a Yorkshire accent.

"But then we were out with some mates, wearing her favourite shoes, and she saw the bloke faffin' about with another woman in the pub. So she got mardy and went off at him. Ended up following him out of the pub and throwing her shoes at him. One of them went down the railway cutting and was never seen again. I had to help her hop home. After that she went off the dress, loaned it to me. Never asked for it back."

She took another sip, and the ice cube slipped over the rim of her glass into her mouth.

"Don't crunch it."

She sat up again, amused. "Why not? I always crunch them."

"I just don't like ice in drinks. Especially whisky!"

"No-one's asking you to crunch the ice."

"Just ... don't."

"It's good to know we both have issues, not just me." She rattled the ice cube noisily around her mouth for a few seconds, smiling at the groan he let out. Then she leaned into him and kissed him. Her mouth was sweet and cold, and as soon as his lips parted under the insistence of hers, she transferred the ice to him.

"That is not nice."

She was giggling, fit to burst.

"Why did you do that?"

"Aversion therapy. It might help."

He dropped the cold lump into his fingers. "Lay back again."

She did, and the opal that had been nestling at her throat slipped down, over her shoulder, leaving the taut, thin silver line of the chain. He replaced it with the ice, touching it to the notch of her throat and using his forefinger to slowly slide it down into the V of the dress.

She flexed her hips with pleasure, and made a small, contented noise, from which he gathered she felt quite differently about ice. When he reached the fabric of her dress, he picked the ice up and returned it to her throat. He repeated the process over and over, following the same path, until a bead of melt water that had collected on her skin rolled under the dress. The feel of the droplet on her abdomen seemed to wake her from her trance, and for the first time since she'd let him play with her feet, he sensed anxiety.

"Strike ..."

He kissed her again. "It's OK, Robin. We're still just finding out what we like. In a few seconds the ice'll be gone, and then maybe it never happened."

She murmured, _OK_ , and settled back. But to make sure she wasn't disturbed by any more stray droplets, he bent his head to her cooled skin to kiss each one away.

When the ice was all gone, she opened her eyes and gave him a blazing stare. Then she looked down at where his mouth had been seconds before.

"Have I been flashing you all this time?"

"Didn't notice."

She sat up and planted her hands on his shoulders. "Bollocks!"

"Well, there might have been moments ..."

"Tit for tat. Time to lose the shirt, Strike."

She undid the top button of his shirt, the difficult one, with both hands and moved south to the next, unfastening them with a deft pinching motion. He helped her draw the fabric free from the waistband of his trousers and she pushed the halves of his shirt front apart.

Smiling (what did that smile mean?) she reached for the remains of her whisky. Dipping her fingers into the glass, she let the single malt drip onto the thick hair covering Strike's chest. It drizzled through to his skin. 

She bit her lip. "Oops."

Sliding from his lap to the floor between his leg and prosthesis, she curled her fingers under his belt and pulled him towards her until his torso was as reclined as hers had been moments before. She bent over him and he felt her tongue probing for droplets of Arran. 

_Fuck. Fuck. Fuck._

She felt him stir and paused for a moment, to catch his eye. Her chin was resting lightly on his sternum and her soft breasts against his groin. She was watchful.

Strike cleared his throat. "Don't mind him. He's always early. Carry on."

So she reached for the glass again.

01:25


	4. Bus Stop Envelope

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> his lips drink water  
> but his heart drinks wine
> 
> e.e. cummings

01:25

Robin's glass was empty, she knew, so she licked the last drop of Arran from Strike's chest and lay her cheek against his stomach. His fingers touched her face and she was dimly aware, under the dominant feeling of having pulled off a major coup against her own inhibitions, of his erection, a hard bar against her right breast.

_Now what, Ellacott?_

"I suppose we can't just lick each other all night."

His stomach shook her free as he laughed. 

"We can if you want."

"Yeah?"

"Anything you want, I want tonight. Didn't I tell you?"

She sat back on her heels and stretched. "Then, I suppose I want to go to bed. Soon. Now. No, soon."

He watched her stand and sat up himself.

"Does that mean we lose the dress?"

"I think it does. I don't have anything else to put on, so I don't want to sleep in it."

"Five more minutes?"

His face was slightly flushed, slightly penitent, or was that because he was lower down? She nodded, and he took hold of her hips and drew her to him, burying his face in her belly. Through the jersey, she could feel the heat of his breath on her.

"Do you like ... being licked?"

Her heart rhythm faltered.

"Yes."

"And tasted?"

She was grateful to him for the euphemism.

"Uh ... yes?" Then more certain, "Yes, I do."

"You're not sure?"

"Not done it much."

"When was the last time?"

"Bonfire Night."

"OK ..."

"2000."

He sighed into her and moved his hands to cup her behind, gently flexing his fingers to knead the muscle.

"Why in god's name hasn't he gone down on you since 2000?"

"It wasn't Matt."

His hands stilled.

"You want to talk me through it while I put this right?"

He nosed lower, until his breath caused the wrapped skirt to flutter against her legs. She closed her eyes and talked about this thing that only one other living soul knew.

"Matt and I had just begun dating, but he didn't want to be exclusive. And I was pretending to be cool with that but I wasn't really."

He parted the wrap and kissed her slowly from mid-thigh upwards.

"So ... he was with someone else in town on Bonfire Night. I put a brave face on it and went to see the Masham bonfire with a friend."

He reached her underwear and paused.

"Go on."

"We both got a bit high on life, admitted we were curious. Found a quiet place in the dark of the trees. Shared a half bottle of vodka."

She felt him chin down her knickers. How many times had he done this, compared to her once? How many women had stood, looking down on him, as he gave them this unalloyed pleasure?

"We didn't undress. It was below zero. We just sort of loosened what we could and leaned against a low branch."

His mouth was on her, wet and warm and wonderful.

"Strike ... I'm going to fall over."

His arms wrapped round her as if to say, no you're not, but he didn't stop. She carried on, braced on his bare shoulders, as best she could.

"They went first because I was kind of scared. It was ... oh ... lovely. We weren't in love, it wasn't a step forward in a relationship, there were no expectations ... it was ... just what it was. In our minds it wasn't even really sex because there were no dicks involved. Then because they'd done it ... I ..."

She shifted her legs and his beard brushed her thighs.

"... I did it too. It seemed easy. I expect ... we were both so turned on we didn't need to be any good. That was the first time I came with somebody else and it was so so quick, like I'd done it myself, but not ..."

She couldn't hold on any more. Her mind refused to be distracted from what he was doing with his lips and his tongue. Clutching his hair, she shuddered her climax, her mind blank of everything else.

01:40


	5. Sea-sand and Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit sequelly to Heart of Stone but you don't have to read that one first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what are heavy?  
> sea-sand and sorrow:  
> what are brief?  
> today and tomorrow:  
> what are frail?  
> spring blossoms and youth:  
> what are deep?  
> the ocean and truth
> 
> Christina Rossetti

01:40

Strike made one last sweep with his tongue and stood, gathering Robin into his arms as he rose. She was shaking, and she pushed her face into his neck before he could look at her. 

Not understanding her reaction, he held her close, until her breathing steadied.

"Take me to bed, Strike."

She was murmuring into his neck, catching his skin with her lips as she spoke. He led her to the bed and finally did what he'd wanted to do since they closed the door to Denmark Street: he pulled the ties on the blue dress and the wrapover collapsed. Robin transformed from dressed to draped and he couldn't help but slide his hands inside the fabric, and catch as much of her warm flesh as he could lay his hands upon. 

They kissed again like they had in the doorway and when they broke they were both breathing harder and smiling. 

"You want to get in?"

She nodded and he turned away so she could dispose of the dress how she wanted, choose a spot and cover herself, or not, just as she liked, without him watching. Quickly stripping to his shorts and dealing with his leg, he turned to tuck under the covers before he looked for her. but she was winding her arms around him and straddling him before he could lay back. 

"So," he smiled. "Here we are."

"Practically courtin'."

He chuckled at the word. 

"Speaking of Yorkshire."

"Yeah?"

"Well, I just had a one or two questions."

"It's being a detective. You can't help it."

"What was Matt's problem? Why did you put up with him? Why?"

"I told you. It wasn't Matt."

"I don't understand."

She took the hand that had teased her with the ice and started to take each finger into her mouth one by one.

"I never told him ... and it was nearly a year later ... that we had sex ... he offered but ..."

"You didn't want it?"

She pressed her cheek into the palm of his hand.

"I made excuses. Like I didn't rule it out but I wasn't comfortable yet ... Matt was always happier when we were having full sex anyway. But really ..."

"You didn't want to?"

She stretched herself against him, like a cat, and kissed his shoulder and his neck. She slid her fingers into his hair and spoke close to his ear.

"Not with him."

"Thank-you."

She smiled and whispered, "You're welcome." and then sat back a little, as Strike's hands wandered up from her hips to touch the underside of her breasts.

"So," she breathed, "Are we going to hear about your first encounter?"

Strike smiled. "Do you want to? 

"Of course."

"Hmm. I was seventeen. Been trying to get a date with the same girl for what felt like years. She stood me up. On Valentine's Day, 1991. Come Summer of 1992, I'm still making a fool of myself."

She was smiling at him, with clearly no sympathy for his teenage angst; he pulled her closer so she could feel how hard he was for her and to let the weight of her against him salve the sting left by the long-lost girls of his youth.

"She professes to be still interested, so we make a date to meet at the caves, Saturday afternoon, when every other red-blooded male will be watching the FA Cup."

"That sounds a bit Enid Blyton. Was there ginger beer?"

"I forget. The caves are where we used to go to ... to ..."

"That's not very Enid. Unless I missed a book. Five Go Dogging on The Beach. Weren't Arsenal in the Cup?"

"Did Wardle say something to you? Because 'how did Arsenal do in the cup in 1992' sounds like something he would tell you to say, if you ever wanted to get me at your mercy."

She started to move against him, a slow press and retreat. "I thought you were already at my mercy?"

"You want to hear this story?"

"Not sure I have the patience. Is it a good one? I want to feel you ..."

"If I can stand it, so can you. So I am a seventeen year old of the world, right? I'm going prepared. The morning of the big day, I get myself to the chemist."

She is trying out the sensation of his chest hair against the tips of her breasts

"I can feel that, you know. It's hair, not Kevlar."

"Sorry, carry on."

"Buy some supplies. Pack of 32, as I recall. Lasted me until the Millennium Party."

"Now I know you're lying. So you get to the caves."

"I go an hour early, because I'm seventeen and about to combust if I don't get laid. But someone is already there to meet me."

She stills as she is suddenly intrigued. "She's an hour early, too?"

Strike shook his head.

"Someone else?"

He nodded and kissed her while he waited to see if she guessed. He felt the penny dropping in the curve of her lips.

"Oh my god. The Saturday girl at the Chemist!"

He laughed. "See, this is why I made you partner."

"You stud!"

"My date arrived and we were in the middle of it."

"Nowhere near good enough, Strike. I need a pen picture. What does 'in the middle of it' mean?"

"She had undone the top few buttons on her uniform. It was like a nurses' ... navy blue. Her bra was black. My trousers were around my ankles. I'd pushed her skirt up and we were against the wall."

"I guess that would do it. Strike, I can't wait much longer ..."

"I know ... Robin, I need it, too ..."

"What did she say? Your date?"

"Nothing. She had a coke from the beach cafe. She threw the whole thing over us, ice cubes and all."

She laughed, and the feel of her shaking against him removed the last few shreds of his control.

02:25


	6. Crescendo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I believe this wave will bear my weight  
> So let it flow
> 
> Sit down, James

02:38

Robin allowed her limbs to fall onto the bed. 

She lay, starfish-like, glistening and boneless, under Strike's panting form.

Shoals of conscious thoughts flitted through her mind and she blearily acknowledged their presence if not their meaning, before they disappeared into the deeps.

The only clear and permanent thought she seemed capable of was of little immediate practical use.

_Holy fucking moly_.

02:37

Strike was driving into her as if he could not help it, as if both their existences depended on passing the point of no return as fast as they could, as if barreling towards the glorious end made it worth plummeting over the top of waterfall, as if this was all that mattered or ever could ... 

He said her name just once and they fell together, into empty space.

02:32

"Are you good? If I ... jesuschrist, I can stop. I can stop if you want me to."

"I don't want you to stop." 

_I want to ride you out, Strike._

_I want to endure._

02:30

He was inside her

and weighing her down

and breathing into her mouth 

and wrapped in her legs 

and filling her arms

and quenching her rational brain

and it felt like nothing that had gone before. 

She might cease to exist. She might be quashed out of existence by the enormity of him, drunk until she was empty, consumed to ashes.

_No._

02:25

She was shaking with laughter when he tipped her over, back onto the bed and pressed himself into her.

"Now?"

"If you want me."

"You have no idea what I want. What I want to do with you ... you can't ..."

"Wrong. I want this, Strike. I want ... you aren't the only person who wants."

"It won't be slow, Robin. You're too ... I'm sorry but it's been too long coming. We'll have to do slow another time."

"I don't care. I want whatever you've got."

"OK."

THE END


End file.
